Dear FCC: Walk the Talk

WASHINGTON—
“I strongly believe
that the interests
of the American
people are served by
a vibrant broadcasting
industry,” FCC Chairman
Tom Wheeler told
NAB Show attendees in April. This is nothing
new. FCC chairmen
and commissioners are never short with
platitudes when it comes to extolling the
benefits of broadcasting; unfortunately too
often their words come across as lip service.
If Chairman Wheeler really believes
in what he says, then it’s time for him to
back them up.

Take ATSC, for example. We recently got an update from the standards
body on progress towards ATSC 3.0,
the next-generation broadcasting standard. The continuing work
to develop and formalize the standard over
the next several years is going to be crucial
in determining the future viability of the
U.S. broadcasting standard and the association
is to be commended on its work to “fast
track” the standard.

A week after the ATSC meeting, the FCC
released its long-awaited report and order
on spectrum incentive auctions. Although
the commission stated that it plans to preserve
the same viewer coverage as of two
years ago, it also advocated using the flawed
“TVStudy” software instead of previous
methods.

The FCC also is ignoring another opportunity
to ensure that the upcoming
spectrum auctions take advantage of advances
in broadcast standards. Coordinating
the spectrum auction schedule with
the development of the ATSC 3.0 standard
could help resolve a number of issues that
prevent more broadcasters from participating
in the voluntary auction as well as
ease the transition for consumers. This view,
advocated by industry veteran Jay Adrick,
would not only create less disruption in
the broadcast marketplace, it’s also possible
because of the Congressionally mandated
schedule that the auction process be
completed by 2022.

Adrick says that despite the commission’s
intent to base a station’s transition
timeline after spectrum repack on the
“complexity” of the transition, “we know
that’s not going to work.”

“That’s what they think they’re going to
do,” Adrick said. “But it’s going to cause confusion
in the marketplace for those people
who view over-the-air. You’re going to see
stations drop out of the scan and viewers
will have to re-scan. Then, if we transition
to 3.0 later, we’re going to have a repeat of
all this.”

One of the broadcast industry’s major issues
with the FCC’s implementation of the
auction is that stations are hesitant to participate
unless they know what their future
coverage will be, as well as the consequences
of moving to new channels. In short, they
need more answers.

Add to this the potential of channel sharing
and the advantages of using the ATSC
3.0’s bandwidth of 26 Mbps as opposed to
the current standard’s 19 Mbps pipe and it’s
obvious that a coordinated effort would be
beneficial to all players involved, especially
if the commission wants more stations to
voluntarily participate.

One FCC official publicly rejected the
idea of a coordinated effort at last year’s
ATSC meeting, according to Adrick, but
with NAB President Gordon Smith’s call
at the NAB Show for a “National Broadcast
Plan,” perhaps it’s time for the Chairman
to “walk the talk” when it comes
to advocating the future of television
broadcasting.